Michaël Borremans

Borremans's ironic homage to French painting tradition, where beauty oscillates between seduction and disturbance, suspended between tenderness and nihilism.

Why go

His first solo show in France in twenty years unsettles the legacy of Chardin, Watteau, and Manet by evoking their sensibility without settling into their history—portraits dissolve into still lifes, and objects simmer with ambiguous affect.

What to expect

Oil paintings ranging from intimate portraits and floral still lifes to provocative imagery (explosive devices, rockets) that blur genre boundaries; works on canvas, linen, and wood panel in varying scales, with installation views showing densely layered compositions.

Things to know

• First Paris solo exhibition since 2006; ninth solo show with David Zwirner.
• Recent retrospective 'A Confrontation at the Zoo' at Museum Voorlinden (2024–25) surveyed twenty years of painting.
• Artist paints from cultural representation, not nature, deliberately engaging with 500 years of Western painting tradition.
• Works reference 18th-century masters Chardin and Watteau while probing contemporary concerns: power, vulnerability, identity, and meaning.
• Borremans is Belgian; represented by David Zwirner galleries.
• Exhibition runs June 5–July 22, 2026 at David Zwirner Paris.

Plan your visit

Gallery hours: Tuesday–Saturday, 11 AM–7 PM. Opening reception Friday, June 5, 6–8 PM. Located at 108 Rue Vieille du Temple, 75003 Paris.